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Harvard reopens after bomb threat; no explosives found

Four buildings on Harvard’s campus in Cambridge had been evacuated due to unconfirmed reports of explosives.

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Security scare at Harvard University after report of explosives being planted. Four buildings evacuated out of 'abundance of caution.'(Reuters)

By Reuters

Mon., Dec. 16, 2013

CAMBRIDGE, MASS.—Harvard University on Monday reopened four buildings at the heart of its centuries-old campus in Massachusetts that had been evacuated earlier after reports that explosives had been planted on the premises.

The Ivy League school said on its online alert system that all four buildings in Cambridge — three classroom facilities and a dorm — had reopened following a sweep by local, state and federal law enforcement officials.

No explosions were reported and neither Harvard officials nor law enforcement reported finding explosive devices. The evacuations resulted in the cancellation of final exams for some classes.

The Harvard campus police, Cambridge Police and Massachusetts State Police, including the bomb squad, responded to the campus, where they set up yellow-taped perimeters around the evacuated buildings and directed students to move away.

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During the search, university officials had closed Harvard Yard — the wooded and currently snow-covered historic centre of the campus — to outside pedestrians, allowing only people who held Harvard identification to enter.

Students gather in the Annenberg Hall after being evacuated from campus buildings, after unconfirmed reports that explosives had been planted at Harvard University on Monday. (THE HARVARD CRIMSON / REUTERS)

People could be seen walking calmly outside the campus. The school, founded in 1636, has about 21,000 students.

Daniel Banks, an 18-year-old freshman from Marlboro, N.J., was about to take a final exam when he was evacuated from Emerson Hall.

“It was my first final ever at Harvard and within a minute it was cancelled,” Banks said. “I never expected anything like this to ever happen at Harvard especially, but I’m glad that nothing real has happened yet.”

Late last month, Yale University in New Haven, Conn., placed its campus on lockdown for most of a day after an anonymous caller warned officials that his roommate was headed to the school planning to shoot people. No gunman was found and police now regard the incident as a hoax.

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